movie reviews…mostly

REVIEW: The Return of the Living Dead (1985)

In honor of the rapture today, I thought I’d watch a movie about the dead rising from the grave. For those of you left on earth, you could have tried harder. But this is for you anyway.

Zombies are all the rage these days, with an endless array of movies, TV shows, books and comics all essentially riffing off the zombie paradigm created by George Romero in 1968. While all others frolic in the playground that Romero created, The Return of the Living Dead goes one step further: It’s premise is based on the idea that the original Night of the Living Dead was true.

It’s an interesting idea. Unfortunately, it’s about the only interesting idea in the entire picture. It’s become a cult classic, mostly because of the tongue-in-cheek performances and 80s punk soundtrack. It’s hard to watch the movie without a smile on your face. But in truth it’s a pretty dreadful movie.

First, through no fault of its own, it was made in 1985. Oh, 80s. Why are you so ugly? Here’s a shot of the gang of punk rockers who go to party in a graveyard while they wait for their friend to get off work. Is there anything less intimidating than punk rockers from the 1980s? And what’s with the girl in the white and pink getup? Why is she hanging around such an unseemly group of miscreants?

The aforementioned friend, Freddy, got a new job at a medical supply company. He’s being shown around on his first day by Frank. Frank is the one who spills the beans about Night of the Living Dead being true. Not only that, the original zombies from that movie are being stored in the basement. He takes Freddy downstairs to show him the zombie canisters, and they naturally release one, along with a bunch of wake-up gas that gets everyone in the nearby cemetery jumping.

From there it devolves into your standard-fare zombie survival pic, with a few notable exceptions: The zombie they release in the basement (known to fans as “Tarman”) is a very cool looking zombie. And he’s a puppet. You gotta love that. He also speaks. All the zombies speak. Mostly, they say, “Brains!” as you’d imagine.

Since the gas wakes up everything that’s dead, and they just happen to be in a medical supply warehouse, we are treated to butterflies pinned to a board, frantically flapping their wings. Also you get the half dog. The half dog is a small, mounted dog sliced in half the long way for use by veterinary schools. One starts barking. It’s hilarious and totally creepy.

The filmmakers change the zombie rules a little bit. In the Romero films, the only way to kill a zombie is to destroy the brain. The first thing our heroes try when the dead rise is to sink a pick axe into the noggin of a raving medical cadaver. It doesn’t work. They cut the thing into pieces, and the severed limbs remain animated (and dangerous). Burning the zombies to ash seems to be they only cure. Luckily, there’s a mortuary next door with a handy-dandy crematorium, and a friendly Nazi who runs the place.

Meanwhile, there’s the super-cool punk rockers in the graveyard. They want to party. One of them likes to talk about imagining her own death. She then takes off all her clothes for no apparent reason and remains butt naked for the rest of the movie. Oh, 80s.

In one surprising turn of events, the black punk rock guy doesn’t die right away. And he does get to call someone a “honky.”

Not much scary here. There is one moment I jumped, when Ernie the mortuary Nazi tries to make a run for a car and finds an ambulance driver being devoured by a little zombie missing his legs. Ernie shoots the zombie, and the little bastard jumps back up and gives chase on his stumps. It was yucky.

And speaking of yucky, our heroes get their hands on another half zombie (another puppet!), strap her to a table and ask her what the hell’s going on. She explains that being dead hurts (bummer) and that they only thing that gives her any relief is to eat brains.

I won’t spoil the ending. There’s a twist. Anybody who paid attention won’t be the least bit surprised, but it was pretty good, I suppose.

If you’re a die hard zombie freak, give this a go. If you’re a fan of tricky sub-sub-genre of the comedy-horror, this one is more successful than most. And if you’re dying to see the half dog, it’s near the beginning.